What do you think?

[casperx875x]

A nurse on our floor was recently joking with a patient about how all the patient needed was a side of chopped beef soup to go with her meal. The next day the nurse brought in a side of chopped beef soup to go with this patient's last hospital meal before being discharged. The patient then mentioned in in her post-hospital stay survey. Our nurse manager then proceeded to recognize this nurse as going above and beyond to please this patient by making mention of it in staff meeting minutes and our board of exceptional behaviors.

I always thought you were not to discriminate, and that you were to treat all patients equally. I do not believe that this type of behavior should have been plastered across the unit like it was, calling it an "exceptional behavior." If you were to bring soup for one patient, you should bring soup for all patients.

[wazmom]

I don't see any problem with doing something nice for a patient. Recognition is also appropriate, although the amount provided seems overdone

[suespets]

i bet if all the pt's had asked for soup,they would all, or none of them get it. imho it's not the one time small nice gesture;It would take several "niceities" that one could call favoritism;or maybe 1 big one.

[ebear, BSN, RN]

It was a very nice thing for her to do. It's a sad day when going out of your way to show kindness may result in offending someone else and then dealing with the "what ifs" that could "possibly" come about (ie: allergies, contamination, legalities, etc.)

[Elvish, BSN, DNP, RN, NP]

I personally don't see the big deal.

[jessiern, BSN, RN]

I feel it is fine to "baby" certain patients. Face it, you are going to have favorites.

I would see it as a problem only if other patients suffered for her going above and beyond for that one.

[jschut, BSN, RN]

I think it was sweet for her to do.

I like to do little nice things for my patients too... unfortunately, they don't all get the same thing or even at the same time, but it is just a little special gift that will cause the patient to feel, "Hey, I really do matter!"

[snowfreeze, BSN, RN]

I have done nice things for patients, shared some of the soup I brought in for staff to share, offered books and recipes, shared DVDs for them to watch a movie while bored at night, etc. I don't see it as having favorites, each person has different needs and when that need is shared with a nurse, if you can assist in providing that then you are just giving good patient care and assisting with healing. One patient needs something that is comforting which may be soup and another just wants to not be bothered all night so get an order for all duonebs and vital signs while awake.

I will never allow myself to be afraid to be nice.

[GooeyRN, ADN, BSN, CNA, LPN, RN]

We do stuff like thatall the time. Its what keeps people coming back instead of going to the city to the bigger better hospitals.

[MoopleRN]

It was just a bowl of soup but I wouldn't have done it. What if there had been an ingredient in that soup that caused an allergic reaction? Ok, the patient hx may state "NKFA" but the key word there is "known". I recognize the nurse's effort/care in bringing in the soup but I don't think it was an appropiate way to convey her care.

I'm all about going "above and beyond". I do it often and more likely than not, don't get recognized for it... which is fine with me. To me, treating all patients equally means giving them all the same quality care I can provide to the best of my abilities. Can I go beyond that for some? Yes, and I do. Just because I can bring soup for one (which I wouldn't in this particular case) doesn't mean I'd bring in soup for all. Not all my patients may be able to eat soup!

They all can, however, get a backrub/massage or some extra TLC....

[NurseCard, ADN]

I just have to also concur, not a big deal.

I might also be frustrated about the NM going crazy with the recognition, but maybe only because nurses do things like that for patients all the time and probably don't get the recognition.

The nurse that got the recognition probably is mortified. I probably would be.

[anonymurse]

It was just a bowl of soup but I wouldn't have done it.

Ditto for me. Cooking is outside my scope of practice. That's why my facility hires folks specially to cook instead of just tacking cooking onto my list of things to do.

But really, this is about personal risk assessment, and we should have built-in, habitual strategies that we have predetermined based on thoughtful personal risk assessment. One of my habits is not to do anything outside my scope of practice, because every little thing done outside one's scope is a gamble. In this case the nurse gambled and won. But let's examine the possible final outcomes.

Nothing goes wrong, patient happy and healthy:

0. Nothing (patient submits no positive feedback on incident).

1. Get positive mention in meeting minutes (manager in good mood), or

2. Someone else gets positive mention, soup bringer gets none (something more substantial was done by someone else), or

3. Get yelled at for risking possible adverse effects (manager in bad mood).

Something goes wrong:

0. Nothing.

1. Get fired.

2. Get sued.

3. Lose license.

Now the chances are remote that something will go wrong. But the chances are remote for me getting some of the diseases I'm vaccinated for, and I wouldn't have passed up the vaccinations for a chance at some minor reward, no matter how likely, equivalent to the reward of positive mention in unit meeting minutes.